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Politics : Middle East Politics -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: steve kammerer who wrote (6221)	4/26/2004 1:25:37 PM
From: rrufff	Respond to of 6945

I think the degree of heroism is very much different though. I would imagine that it is a tiny, tiny group that would worship this nut, yet the suicide bombers are heroes to the vast majority of the people. Polls of Pals. may indicate that they oppose suicide bombing (there was one this weekend that was about 55% in favor of suicide bombing) but the bombers are treated as martyred heroes and funds are raised for their families throughout the Arab world. There is a difference.

To: steve kammerer who wrote (6221)	4/26/2004 2:53:54 PM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 6945

Your facts are wrong. Only a tiny fringe in Israel supported Goldstein, that is correct. But a very large minority of the Palestinians support Hamas. Remember as you read this that Hamas' program, openly declared, is to kill or drive out every Jew from the Mideast. Khalil Shikaki runs the most respected Palestinian polling outfit: Shikaki said he has been tracking four essential issues among the Palestinian public since the early 90s: balance of power; the perception of violence vis-a-vis Israelis; compromise and the legitimacy of the political system. In terms of balance of power, Shikaki found that the intifada reversed the trend toward growing support for the mainstream that had existed during the previous five years, when the Islamists had only 17 percent support. Hamas and Islamic Jihad failed to capitalize on any of the Palestinian Authority's (PA) problems until 2000, at which point they made gains because of the outbreak of violence. Support for Hamas grew to 35 percent, making it the largest faction in Gaza and (in combination with Islamic Jihad) the largest faction in the West Bank, in both cases overtaking Fatah. Shikaki believes ideological support for Hamas remains around 20 percent, but the group gets additional backing as it now delivers on the desire of Palestinians for revenge. If a way is found to lower the Palestinian perception of threat, support for Hamas will once again decline, but if the situation continues, Hamas will grow stronger. On the issue of violence, Shikaki found the intifada stokes support for it, and a re-enforcing cycle of violence has been created. Palestinians overwhelmingly believe that violence pays and achieves political benefits that negotiations cannot. dailystar.com.lb